In Modesto, teacher Nancy Barajas greets exams with a disco ball and a dance, and the district’s steady test gains drew attention alongside turnaround efforts in Detroit and reforms in Southern states like Louisiana and Alabama. Researchers from Harvard, Stanford and Dartmouth used an Education Scorecard covering thousands of districts to show a national slide in reading that predates the pandemic, while some places beat the trend by shifting instruction and cracking down on chronic absenteeism. This piece follows those examples—Modesto’s classroom routines, Detroit’s lawsuit-funded rebuild and southern policy moves—to show what’s changing and what still needs work.

Nancy Barajas runs a light-hearted ritual before tests: dim the lights, cue a playlist, spin a disco ball and let sixth graders move. The brief celebration in Modesto is meant to calm students and boost confidence before they settle into exams, and teachers say it helps set the tone for focused work afterward. The district also rebuilt reading programs and invested in teacher training, which shows up in recent score improvements.

The national picture is tougher. Scholars who compiled the Education Scorecard found that only five states and the District of Columbia showed meaningful reading growth from 2022 to 2025, and across the country students still sit nearly half a grade behind pre-pandemic reading levels. Math mostly improved, but reading has been sliding since the mid-2010s, long before COVID interrupted classrooms.

“The pandemic was the mudslide that had followed seven years of steady erosion in achievement,” said Thomas Kane, a Harvard professor who helped create the Education Scorecard. Researchers point to a mix of causes: reduced recreational reading as phones and social apps dominate kids’ spare time, changes in accountability, and instructional approaches that de-emphasized phonics for too long. The National Assessment of Educational Progress shows declines that began well before any school closures.

Some districts reversed course by returning to phonics and adding supports for struggling readers. States that saw reading gains—like Louisiana, Maryland, Tennessee, Kentucky and Indiana—pushed schools to adopt a phonics-based method known as the “science of reading” and made screening for dyslexia and teacher coaching routine. Training programs such as LETRS, or Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling, became a paid professional development path in places like Modesto.

Modesto spent to train teachers and created a new department to support English learners, which bumped its scores enough to represent an extra 18 weeks of learning in math and 13 weeks in reading. Still, overall proficiency remains below grade level, showing how far districts must go even after measurable progress. Meanwhile, nearly every state in the Scorecard saw math gains from 2022 to 2025, and student absenteeism dropped in most places.

Policy changes didn’t guarantee success everywhere. States including Florida, Arizona and Nebraska altered reading instruction but still saw test scores fall, underscoring that rolling out new standards, training and coaching takes time and consistent follow-through. In districts that did prioritize screening and daily literacy practice, improvements were clearer, but teachers and leaders warn against quick fixes without sustained support.

Detroit’s improvement story includes a legal battle and a large settlement that paid for system rebuilding. A lawsuit over poor school conditions produced more than $94 million in settlement funds used to improve buildings, hire staff and expand tutoring and attendance work. “It took a lot to rebuild systems, and now kids are learning at higher levels, but I’m still not satisfied. And I think that’s the next challenge: continuing to motivate, inspire and change things,” said Detroit Superintendent Nikolai Vitti.

Munger Elementary-Middle School in Detroit used settlement dollars to employ 18 educators for small-group support and to fund an attendance agent who proactively reaches out to families, even visiting homes. First grade teacher Samantha Ciaffone recalls a time when several students were absent daily; now she typically sees one or two absences and says, “It allows us to be better educators to see kids consistently in the seat instead of once or twice a week.” That consistency makes classroom interventions and daily practice more effective.

The South has provided notable examples of turnaround. Louisiana and Alabama made big shifts to research-based instruction and funded teacher training and coaching, and those moves show up in their score trends. Alabama paired a phonics mandate with a Numeracy Act to standardize math instruction and require interventions for students who fall behind, while Oxmoor Valley Elementary in Birmingham added a full-time math specialist to help students catch up.

Local leaders emphasize high expectations alongside supports. “We can provide all of these supports, but at the same time, hold kids to high expectations,” Birmingham Superintendent Mark Sullivan said, and researchers point out that this kind of sustained, statewide push can move the needle. “We made enormous progress as a country in terms of educational success from over a 30-year period. Test scores went up dramatically,” said Stanford professor Sean Reardon, noting past gains as proof improvement is possible again.

Back in Modesto’s Fairview Elementary, daily routines now include a quick fluency drill after the dance break: the class reads a short text together for one minute, then pairs practice aloud, with English learners matched to fluent speakers and each child getting individual time with the teacher. Those small, repeatable practices aim to build automaticity and confidence. “Eventually, you get through the word like it’s water,” one boy said. “You just say it smooth.”